Just a Little Favor
by kyotoagnes
Summary: After the third time, saving world gets kind of old, but leave it to Zack & Aerith to find a way to keep Cloud interested. Confused and morally conflicted but definitely interested.


Title: Just a Little Favor

Pairings: Previous Z x C, and onesided S x C this Chapter  
Status: Ongoing  
Rating: M or NC-17 (hopefully)  
Warnings: Violence, Yaoi

Disclaimer: Squaresoft (now Square Enix) owns, I am but a humble supplicant before their altar.

Summary: After the third time, saving world gets kind of old, but leave it to Zack & Aerith to find a way to keep Cloud interested. Confused and morally conflicted but definitely interested.

Chapter 1: He was doomed, utterly doomed

Cloud didn't dream anymore. After the nightmares that had visited him nightly for years he had never thought he would ever miss dreaming. But he did. Every night he closed his eyes and every night nothing, just darkness until he woke. It came hard and lifted just as fast. It was unnatural, almost induced. Cloud didn't tell Tifa, coming so soon after the Remnant mess she'd worry. Even so he was starting to wonder if there was something to worry about. He never dreamed until one night he finally did. He opened his eyes to light instead of darkness and Zack and Aerith.

"I should have realized it was you two." He said dryly. Zack had the good grace to look sheepish, Aerith just looked sad.

"What?" Cloud asked, when they came to him they tried so hard to be cheerful an act he found fairly hard to face at times. Now Aerith was sad that did not bode well.

Zack knelt in front him eyes solemn as well. He held out a gloved hand and Cloud shivered as the leather touched his face, it felt so real in these dreams. He could almost, but no...

"How do you feel buddy?"

"Fine, except for the whole no dreams part. What is going on?" Cloud was getting rather sick of the dancing around they were doing.

"We had to cut you off, she'll get to you in your dreams and thats the last thing we need."

Cloud stiffened. There was only one she that any of them ever worried about.

" She's back isn't she?" Cloud's voice was flat and quiet.

"Buddy she never left." Zack tapped a gloved finger on Cloud's forehead.

"She's been in your head, in the heads of everyone, it was muted when she was in the Northern Crater but now that she's out thanks to the Sephy juniors and Shinra and she's not happy. I bet even Rufus has a headache by now, she's howling so loud."

Cloud could guess, he'd heard the echoes of Jenova's howl in Sephiroth's voice, in the labs. Hearing her at full force would be unpleasant to say the least.

"Where is she?"

Zack stood up and frowned down at him.

"Right now you couldn't get within ten feet of her before she dropped you. Hell I couldn't either. Hojo shoved too much of her into us and she's been at us for too long." Just as suddenly Zach smiled and Cloud knew that smile, even seven years later he flinched. That smile was trouble even when Zack was dead.

"Aerith and I have a plan."

He was doomed, Cloud decided as Aerith suddenly popped her head over Zack's shoulder and smiled her own version of Zack's smile, utterly doomed.

He was being turned inside out, Cloud gritted his teeth as the world spun around him and tried to keep himself from throwing up. He really hated having mako enhanced senses sometimes and traveling between dimensions mounted on Fenrir was not helping, how had Zack talked him into this? Oh yeah, the promise to save at least two worlds. His own and the one they were sending him to. A world he was going to arrive at throwing up apparently. Suddenly reality snapped back so sudden and abrupt he was left gasping and in the middle of a fight. He triggered Fenrir open and went off the bike grabbing the First Tsugiri's primary blade as he went down behind the bike. He really liked Fenrir at times like these. Hell he pretty much liked Fenrir all the time but times like these, he loved it. He leaned around the front fender, and found himself staring in shock, but no real surprise, at his usual nightmare. Sephiroth was finishing off the last of a group of Shinra infantry men. Well wasn't that familiar too. His hand yanked the rest of Tsugiri's blades on the left loose, and threw himself over onto the other side to get the rest, he'd need them all to do this. He slid the blades together and went back over Fenrir straight at Sephiroth.

After the third time of doing this he'd gotten rather harsh in his outlook, just get it over with, get it done. There was no way to fix Sephiroth, no way to heal him. Zack and Aerith had tried. He was just putting him out of everyone else's misery and his own. Cloud swung, even as he did knowing he wasn't going to connect. The screaming clang as First Tsugiri and Masamune met echoed across the chaos. His eyes met Sephiroth's and he felt a dull ache as he stared into that usual madness.

"And you would be?" Sephiroth purred.

Cloud disengaged and readied for another round.

"The end" . He said and swung again.

What followed next would be spoken of by witnesses for years and would be analyzed by military specialists for a century. It was also rather epic for its scale, property damage, defiance of gravity and most of the rules of physics. They cut through buildings, cars, a few tanks, one water tower, and a train car leaving chaos and fire in their wake. Half an hour in Sephiroth connected, Cloud bit back a cry as Masamune went deep into his side, not fatal but it could bleed him dry if he kept fighting, it was time to end this. He pulled away, took a staggering step and triggered Omnislash. It all seemed so hauntingly familiar right down to the expression on Sephiroth face when the blades cut deep. The only difference was that this time he caught the leather clad body even as Masamune fell to the ground with a dissonant clatter.

"Ssh, I have you, its okay." Cloud didn't even stop wonder why he was doing this, he knew. He'd had done this three times before and never had this chance. Sephiroth never made a sound, just looked at him with those mad, mad eyes. Cloud heard the sound of voices and prayed to the Gods they wouldn't interfere or that he wouldn't bleed out quite dramatically over the top of Sephiroth before he said what he needed to say.

"It'll be over soon. I forgive you, Zack does to," Cloud took a deep breath, his fingers closed over Sephiroth's hand. "I love you and I'm sorry." He said everything a twenty one year old whose mind was broken by five years of medical torture and a dip in the lifestream hadn't been able to two times ago. He was still whispering when Sephiroth's hand went limp in his. He could feel the wash of heat down his side, if he hadn't had the mako he'd be dead all ready. A tide of red was darkening his pants and the black of Sephiroth's coat was darkening further. Yeah he was about to embarrass himself, Cloud realized as the voices got louder in his ears then he was gone.

"What a fuckin' mess." Reno tapped the EMR in his hand against his leg and then winced. They'd spent the last six hours fighting off Sephiroth clones and one had gotten in a good shot all down his side.

"Ribs okay?" His partner asked. Reno just grunted, they still had a lot to do including figuring out what the hell had happened to Sephiroth. All of sudden the assaults had stopped and then there'd been explosions and reports of a running fight, and now silence which was making him even more nervous. Because they'd come to learn through the last two years a quiet Sephiroth was a dangerous Sephiroth. He finally reached the top of the debris field and came to a stop. Unless of course, Reno decided as he looked down at two collapsed bodies, Sephiroth was dead.

"Lets move." His partner slid down the slope with his usual careless disregard of safety.

"Fuck." Reno followed him down with his own reckless disregard for safety. All in all it made quite a scene Reno decided as he hit the bottom. There was a scarlet swath of blood spilling across the rubble, he could see that particular shade of Sephiroth's hair, or at least a clone version. But Reno couldn't see the face of the body slumped over Sephiroth. He'd bet from the blood he was dead to.

"C'mon, lets verify." Because he so wanted to know Sephiroth was dead. He reached out and poked his EMR at the body which promptly slumped over and backwards.

"What the fuck?" For a moment Reno almost dropped his EMR as he stared down at the bloody unconscious body at his feet.

"Well Sephiroth or his clone is d..." His partner's voice trailed off as he caught sight of the body.

"What the hell is this?" Turk Strife stared down at a bloodier unconscious version of himself blankly.

**( ****Read more...**** )**


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